Title I-derland

A Swinging Pendulum?

August 31, 2011 – 8:00 am | By Chuck Edwards | No comments yet

Rewarding schools for making progress may be a reasonable basis for accountability, but few would argue that mere “progress” is enough if it leaves kids stranded short of college readiness. That is a brief summary of the current debate about NCLB accountability. As Nancy Connor blogged here recently, we need to avoid a mere swing of the pendulum, back to the bad old days where any progress at all was good enough for kids in low-income schools, regardless of whether it moved them significantly toward the achievement of their more advantaged peers. This concern may or may not be unfounded, but it is worth exploring why so many education advocates fear the unbridled triumph of growth models. After all, NCLB was widely billed as a revolution, which means that it overthrew “something.” That “something” was the “soft bigotry of low expectations,” as President George W. Bush so eloquently put it. NCLB’s 10-year timeframe for universal proficiency was an understandable, if radical, reaction to these “low expectations.” Many argue that NCLB went too far. If so, it was merely the farthest swing of the pendulum from no standards at all, which was the case in the early years of Title I. And the pendulum traced a long arc getting to NCLB. The first step was the 1988 version of the law, which established an improvement process for under-performing Title I programs. But the trigger for improvement was pathetic: a Title I program was deemed to be performing adequately if it showed any student growth at all, however small. After a year of schooling, if a Title I kid advanced in achievement by a year and a day, that was good enough! In a way, this was a kind of crude growth model; it was based on movement away from a starting point. The problem was that it did not take into account the critical question of whether it brought children significantly toward high achievement, which is the real objective. As a metric, mere "growth" got a bad name. The 1994 version of the law, the Improving America’s Schools Act (IASA), looked tougher at first: It required states to establish school goals that would ensure “continuous and substantial yearly improvement … sufficient to achieve the goal of all children served under Title I” meeting state standards. For the first time, the law looked ahead, rather than behind — not at children’s growth away from their previous low achievement but at their progress toward proficiency. But IASA set no timeline and no standards for that goal. As the Citizens Commission on Civil Rights pointed out in an influential report, this allowed states to set timelines that left students under-performing far into the distant future. So Congress decided that if states would not set ambitious targets, it would do so for them. Hence, we ended up with an impractical 2014 deadline and a system whose primary index of success — the pass-fail adequate yearly progress standard — arguably gives insufficient credit to high-poverty schools that have moved children far from an often-low starting point. Now, many educators with long memories worry that the pendulum is swinging back to an accountability system that tolerates poor performance. Given Title I’s history — and the current hostility to everything NCLB — it is no wonder that folks are sensitive. But it must also be acknowledged that the terms of the debate have changed. The new, more sophisticated growth models may well fulfill dual objectives: giving credit to schools for growth from low achievement, while still demanding that students actually get to the goal — proficiency — by the time they leave school. If the pendulum is swinging, at least the arc is smaller. And that is a blessing. Photo Credit: Geoff Ackling

Give AYP Some Respect

August 30, 2011 – 8:00 am | By Nancy Connor | 3 comments

Amid all of the calls for waiver relief from some of the most difficult requirements of NCLB, I think we may need to take a step back and remember the good that has actually come from the law. Take AYP, for example. It has several well-recognized problems. It looks at only one measure of achievement, has impossible expectations, doesn’t give schools credit for how far they have come, and then, worst of all, does not differentiate between broad and limited failure when dishing out consequences. Clearly, AYP was not as-well-thought out as it should have been, even if most people thought that reauthorization would have fixed its problems before they got out of hand. But AYP does have a couple of things going for it that are often overlooked. The aspect of AYP I have always liked is that it exposes what I like to call the “dirty little secret” of some high-performing schools. While a school might have great test scores overall, there frequently are one or more of the famous subgroup categories where achievement levels do not keep up with the rest of the school. AYP did a very good job of helping all of us look at the achievement of everyone in a school and then figure out what to do about it. In schools that were doing poorly overall, this aspect wasn’t quite so critical, but even in those cases, it was helpful to learn, say, that math achievement was much higher than reading achievement. It enabled schools to focus on areas of greatest need. It also gave the district a clear view of where it should go to look at best practices. If a school was doing very well with a group of students that were struggling everywhere else, AYP let us know. The other thing I personally liked about AYP — something that will possibly be lost as growth models replace it — is the way it measured achievement against a fixed standard. I think we need to examine and encourage growth, particularly in schools that start really low and have so far to go to catch up, but we need to keep the target of real proficiency in mind. To a college admissions office, it doesn't matter if you are the highest achiever in a high growth school. If your individual achievement as measured by a test such as the ACT isn't high enough, you won't get in. Achievement against a standard does matter. For schools, graduating students who are ready to succeed in a four-year college should be the goal. It gives students the only real choice they have for careers. Not going to college may be an appropriate decision for some students, but they should at least have that choice. And it is no choice at all if they can’t get in. So, let’s be thoughtful when we do get around to reauthorizing NCLB. Don’t undercut what is working by a rush to fix what is not. Nancy Connor is the director of federal programs for the Denver Public Schools. Photo Credit: The Respect Institute

Book Giveaway vs. Mothra

August 26, 2011 – 5:41 pm | By Andrew Brownstein | No comments yet

I don’t know about you, but the one-two punch of Tuesday’s earthquake and this weekend’s onslaught of Hurricane Irene has me a little nervous. I’m just glad they didn’t happen at the same time, because I’m pretty sure that’s when this happens. Stay safe, everyone. Compared to these earth-shattering events, it’s easy to forget quotidian things like the weekly book giveaway. But here at Title I-Derland, we never forget. So, it gives us great pleasure to announce the latest winner, Jeanyne Gomez, Title I coordinator for the Little Falls Community Schools in central Minnesota. Congratulations, Jeanyne! Jeanyne was excited even to enter the competition. "What a great resource," she said at the time. "I find in the complicated world of ESEA, I’m always willing to take advantage of anything that will help in my understanding. The blog and the possibility of getting a free Title I publication is awesome." Jeanyne has requested a copy of ED 101: Q&As for ESEA Program Administrators. This week, she was swamped with back-to-school training. Right now, the hardest thing about her job is adjusting to a new financial system the state has implemented for submitting grants. She says, “The book will help clarify questions I have with programming.” If you, too, would like to win a free Thompson how-to book, entering is easy peasy: 1. Go to the “Post a Comment” section below any post; 2. Enter your name, email address and the name and format of the publication you’d like; and 3. Hit “Post Comment.” All of these publications are available in hard copy, as well as downloadable pdfs:

• ED 101: Q&As for ESEA Program Administrators
• Home and School: Bridging the Gap with Title I Parental Involvement
• Making the Grade: A Primer on Title I Accountability and School Improvement
• Private Schools, Public Funds: Providing Title I Services To Private School Children
• The Do’s and Don’ts of Education Compliance: Audits, Monitoring and Compliance

Note that you DON’T need to register or subscribe in order to be eligible for the giveaway – we just need to know who you are, how to get in touch with you if you win, and which publication you’d like. If you’ve entered, but haven’t won yet we’ll keep rolling your name over. Each Thursday between now and September 16, we’ll draw a name from all those who’ve entered to date, and each Friday we’ll announce that week’s winner here on the blog. That means three more chances to win. Photo Credit: aareps

Tough Tango with Title I

August 25, 2011 – 8:00 am | By Nancy Connor | 1 comment

(Note: This post has been updated to reflect a clarification regarding New Mexico's monitoring findings.) If you hear heavy breathing, the person gasping for breath is me! It has taken a lot of work, but I’m getting good at dancing with all three of my partners: the district, the state and the increasingly intrusive feds. Before NCLB, I didn’t have to dance. District reform was only a rumble on the horizon, and the feds and state officials stayed in the background. Funding was relatively insignificant and the usual stand-alone intervention programs were thought to serve a good purpose. There really were no competing priorities. Things changed when NCLB became law. The feds became major players in the education game, mandating programs like supplemental educational services (SES) and public school choice. Title I funding was increased to pay for them. Initially, very few schools were in improvement, so the required 20 percent set-aside was more than was needed to satisfy the demand for services. District leadership viewed excess SES/choice funding as a way to move their priorities forward. What if the “surplus” was not reallocated directly to schools but was instead used for district reform efforts? After all, Title I schools needed those programs, and the feds were touting flexibility. What if schoolwide schools used Title I funds to purchase coaches supported by central professional development from the district?  How about a centrally run reading program? However, this “creative” approach to allocating federal funds started to pose compliance questions. Reform and compliance began to compete. My job became a dance. I had to know the law really well, explain district thinking to the state and then convince our district leadership that the gray area of compliance only stretched so far. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act brought millions of dollars with a two year time limit.  It didn’t make sense to distribute everything directly to schools if a funding cliff and massive cuts were waiting around the corner just two years later. Publicity around the funds said that their purpose was to leverage change for student achievement, but missing in the rhetoric was the fact that Title I funds are only for Title I schools. Compliance began to seem like an obstruction to reform. Why would a district design and implement high quality professional development systems or pilot alternate pathways to graduation, but only for Title I schools? Many non-Title I schools have an  equal need of these programs, and it seemed pretty short-sighted to limit their implementation. One solution during the two years it took to plan, design, implement and evaluate those programs was to designate Title I schools as pilots. This satisfied district leadership, since the programs would not be funded with Title I funds forever. Coming up with inventive but hopefully compliant solutions required some complicated dance steps on my part. In the end, I think we made good use of the funds and the district is better for them, but I am glad they are gone! Now we are looking at the waiver process, and if reauthorization ever occurs, it may bring potential changes more radical even than NCLB. The flexibility drum keeps getting louder, but what will be the price? Will the State and Local Funding Flexibility Act, which permits districts to move funds between several programs, mean that Title I loses its focus and essentially becomes a slush fund?  Mushy requirements for the use of these funds could make them easy targets for cuts. Recent New Mexico monitoring findings found the centrally run Title I programs in the two districts visited in violation of the rule that Title I schools receive funds (or Title I-funded goods and services) strictly according to their percentage of low-income children. How does that jibe with the new push to give districts greater freedom to allocate funds to support locally developed  interventions for their schools?  And potential changes to toughen up comparability calculations could put federal rules in conflict with new state rules that give “innovation” schools more control over people, time and money. Will efforts to improve equity hobble these schools’ ability to shift resources where they want them? Uncertainty prevails. I feel myself dancing harder and faster. I keep learning new steps.  I’ve learned to dip and sway. I can compete with the best of them.  But I worry that it is not good enough. Nancy Connor is the director of federal programs for the Denver Public Schools. Photo Credit: Otto Polina

Changing the Focus

August 24, 2011 – 8:00 am | By Chuck Edwards | No comments yet

Using data from 19 states that disaggregate Title I students’ test scores, the respected and prolific Center on Education Policy has produced an analysis that says that Title I appears to have raised the achievement of Title I students overall in the past decade. It also appears to have helped close gaps in achievement between Title I participants and their non-Title I peers. Good news, of course. But what struck me was the focus on Title I participants, per se. It is one of the few recent studies that have actually looked at the impact of the program on children who directly participate in it, rather than on high-poverty schools as a group. Partly, this is due to structural changes in Title I, which make it hard to gather the necessary data. But it is also due to the expansion of federal ambitions since the enactment of the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The study’s basic question — “What is the impact of the program on its participants?” — may seem small potatoes when the government is seeking to reform the nation’s educational system as a whole. Most studies now ask the much broader question: “Is federal intervention bringing all children to proficiency?” The questions have evolved along with the program. But as the word “evolve” implies, the changes have been so gradual that it is easy to lose sight of how significant they are. A comparison of how we “interrogate” the program, then and now, can help us grasp the scope of these changes. So, when and why did the questions change? The genesis was probably a 1986 meta-analysis that concluded that, while Title I children made gains, “their gains [did] not move them substantially toward the achievement levels of more advantaged students.” This disappointing judgment was based on a full two decades of data. In fact, the program’s original design made it relatively easy (in theory, anyway) to isolate its effects. Title I services were delivered primarily through the targeted assistance model. Under this model, identified low-achieving children typically were “pulled out” from their classes for 30 minutes each day to receive additional intensive instruction in small groups. Title I children were, ipso facto, those children who received Title I services; for researchers, it was not hard to identify their universe of “subjects.” Education reformers drew the conclusion that Title I’s limited interventions were insufficient to offset the impact of receiving a poor education in the regular system during the rest of the day. The answer was to ditch Title I’s “retail” approach of remediating instructional gaps, child by child, and instead change the entire educational environment. After some baby steps in 1988, Congress took a giant leap toward this goal in 1994, when it decided to allow all high-poverty schools to use their Title I funds on a schoolwide basis to improve teaching for all their children. Because all children in a schoolwide program are considered to be served by Title I, one consequence was to dramatically inflate the number of children “served” by Title I. In school year 1994-95, there were 6.7 million Title I children, of which relatively few were in schoolwide programs. By 2004-05, there were 20 million, of which 87 percent were in schoolwide programs. This weakened the visible link between Title I “services” and Title I “children,” making it hard to isolate the program’s impact on the achievement of any individual child. At the same time, the new focus on system change prompted a broader evaluation of Title I’s impact on schools as a whole. Researchers now examined achievement differences between high-poverty and low-poverty schools, without asking whether the schools even received Title I funds (although the majority of very high-poverty schools do). States still were asked to report achievement data for their Title I children, but these data were increasingly regarded as low quality, so researchers turned to the high quality data generated by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The problem is that NAEP data, while more accurate, cannot be disaggregated for Title I participation. No Child Left Behind has pretty much completed the transition. NCLB requires states to disaggregate student achievement data in many ways, but Title I participation is not among them. So no nationwide comparison is possible. Fortunately, as CEP noted in its report, some states still disaggregate scores for Title I students, which made their study possible. It is worth noting this evolution. A key evaluation question that dominated the field in its first three decades — the effect Title I has on its direct participants — has become a research backwater. As the federal role has expanded, so have the questions. Photo credit:  Adam Wylde

Sticking it to ‘The Man’

August 23, 2011 – 8:00 am | By Neerav Kingsland | 6 comments

Once, someone asked me about the modern education reform movement, and this is what I said: “The past twenty years of education reform consist of brilliant people working very, very hard to achieve moderate gains.” Why has this occurred? See picture below: In short: we’ve built an irrational system. Let’s just call it ‘The Man’ — and we all know who the Man is. The Man is the existing structure, one that evolved over time to serve a now-vanished 19^th century world and no longer serves its original purpose. The Man causes rational people to act in ways that cause the whole system harm. And, when it comes to educators — specifically, unions and charters — who are held down by the Man, I can sympathize with both sides of the debate. Why do I sympathize with the union perspective?

1. In most cities, there is only one major employer (the Man) in town – if you get fired, you can never work again at a public school in the town you live in, even if you’re fired for a terrible reason.
2. If you stay in the classroom, there’s a high likelihood you’re going to work for a low-quality principal at some point. Or you might just work for criminals.
3. If you get a bad principal and this principal fires you – there goes your career.
4. So is it crazy that unions have gravitated toward job protection? I don’t think so. When there’s one dysfunctional employer (the Man) in town, job protection matters.

Why do I sympathize with the charter school perspective?

1. Everyone will criticize you on the grounds that your work is not important because charters will never get to scale and serve the majority of students. Even your friends have doubts.
2. Most district leaders will fight to prevent you from opening a school and probably not give you a facility.
3. And they’ll probably give you less money too.
4. So is it crazy that you don’t scale to serve more kids? I don’t think so. The system (the Man) is structured to stifle your growth.

Here’s a real life anecdote: My friend is a teacher in DC who could not stand Michelle Rhee (the Man!). He then accused me of being in Rhee’s camp. I said, “Well, I do agree with some of her policies, but here’s the thing: I don’t think superintendents should have power over you either.” I told him to start a charter school and design whatever teacher evaluation system he thought was good and then prove it works by getting results. So, why can’t we all just get along?  In other words, why don’t all the rational actors stand up together to fight the “Man”? Here’s the pessimistic view: (a) unions don’t think they can actually compete in an open system, so they support districts’ existence to enable lucrative collective bargaining agreements; and (b) charter schools actually need districts because they don’t want to be forced to serve every kid in the system — they would rather cherry-pick and leave the hard-to-serve kids behind. Here’s the optimistic view: (a) union members really do want to be released from poor management so that great educators can control their own destiny; and (b) charter school leaders really do want to be part of building a comprehensive charter district that ensures every child is served every time. There’s only one way to find out which view is correct. And it’s not by listening to union and charter leaders talk. It’s by doing. One way to make sure the system is rational is to change the role of government from operator to regulator (other industry examples here, and here). The government sets the rules, enforces the rules and holds schools accountable for results. Schools that thrive can expand. Schools that struggle are transitioned to new management. Unions bargain with school operators, not the government. Most likely, this will take the form of charter school districts. Evidence that charters vary in performance is here. Evidence that thoughtfully developed charter districts can work is here. Here’s what we can find out if we have a rational system:

1. Can unions add value when educators have a choice of employer?
2. Can charter schools actually scale to serve every child in a city?

Answering these questions is essential. And with answers in hand, maybe we can ensure that the next twenty years of education reform aren’t two more decades of great educators working very, very hard for moderate results. Let’s make the system rational. Is the Man getting you down? Well, at the risk of being crude: F*** the Man. Photo Credit:Kazue Didi (This guest post was written by Neerav Kingsland, Chief Strategy Officer of New Schools for New Orleans.)

Technology vs. Title I

August 22, 2011 – 8:00 am | By David DeSchryver | 2 comments

In a prior post, I noted that there is a disparity between current federal fiscal requirements and the way districts and schools are implementing instructional technologies. The technologies are way ahead of the assumptions that underlie the fiscal requirements. This is resulting in frustration for district program and fiscal directors who now have to be more creative in order to be compliant, and that is not good because it makes things unnecessarily complicated. No one doubts that the fiscal rules serve an important purpose.  Let’s use Title I’s “supplement, not supplant requirement” as an example. The purpose of the requirement is basically to ensure that Title I funds are used to add on to and not replace state and local funds. The requirement applies in a “targeted assistance” or “schoolwide” setting. The distinction is important but the issue emerges most frequently in the targeted assistance setting, so let’s examine that first. (I’ll discuss schoolwide in more depth in a subsequent post. Also, be sure to check out Melissa Junge and Sheara Krvaric’s paper on SNS here and here.). Auditors will look at each individual cost supported with Title I funds and ask three questions. If the answer is “yes” to any of the three, it is presumed that the federal funds supplant or replace state or local funds, and that creates a fiscal liability.

• Does the state or district require the program or services at issue regardless of the availability of federal funds?
• Did the state or district use state or local funds to pay for the program or services in prior years?
• Are state and local funds used to pay for the program or services for non-Title I eligible students?

The rule makes sense when applied to physical goods and services. It loses usefulness, however, with emerging virtual educational technologies. To clarify this point, I spoke to Michael Horn, the co-founder and executive director of Education of Innosight Institute, a nonprofit think tank devoted to applying the theories of disruptive innovation to problems in the social sector (he knows his stuff, so pay attention). Michael points out that the market for personalized, tech-driven, academic instruction is growing.  It took a foothold with credit recovery courses, grew into advanced coursework and is now making headway in high schools, with the lower grades close behind. Every year, additional evidence pops up to support his thesis, such as Rocketship Education and Grockit’s adaptive and collaborative instruction technologies. The list is growing — quickly. These instructional tools are blurring the distinction between supplemental and non-supplemental services. Consider “game” learning as an example. One of the reasons that gaming is a hot education topic these days is because it requires students to master a topic before moving on. The technology adapts to the student’s level, and the student plays the game until he or she masters it. That is typically the opposite of what happens in a traditional classroom. (See Michael’s Education Next article on that here.) Finally, Michael makes the point that smart district managers should deploy successful technologies as broadly as they can. Part of their job description is — or should be — to maximize the return on their investment (ROI) according to fiscal and academic indicators. Unlike the case with traditional “supplemental” material, the walls of a classroom, school or district do not bind instructional technology. The costs of scaling up, if they exist at all, are minimal. The ROI logic is clear. Why isn’t this happening more quickly? The current federal fiscal rules are, no doubt, part of the reason. Now, go back and look at the three questions that give rise to the presumption of supplanting.   The third, in particular, is problematic. The district cannot use state or local funds to pay for services that are also provided to Title I students with Title I funds. If we think it through, that means that Title I cannot be used for a program that can provide both supplemental instruction to eligible at-risk students and basic services for non Title I eligible students. In other words, Title I cannot handle the emerging adaptive instructional technology programs that can and are doing both. The result is inefficient. Compliance concerns are undermining smart business rules that focus on efficiency and effectiveness. I think it’s crazy and totally unproductive — unless you are an auditor or attorney. I am pretty sure that is not what Congress intended to do with these rules, although with all the attorneys doing policy work in DC — guilty — you can never be too sure. This post was written by guest contributor David DeSchryver, vice president of education policy at Whiteboard Advisors. Photo Credit: Jon Brouchoud